Today's newsletter. Cheery topic!

I missed this: Govt published LPC's remit for the 2027 minimum wage rates on Monday (the rates coming in next month are already set). Main take-away is Govt wants a more cautious approach to the youth rates. It has dialed up the 'worry about employment' bit of the remit. www.gov.uk/government/p...

Good thread, this is the key point. Far too many people in British politics seem to not understand that ultimately the thing causing the energy price shock is...the world doesn't have as much energy as it did before Trump invaded Iran, something with real and deadly consequences.

A genuinely big announcement on English devolution from Rachel Reeves today! As we at @instituteforgovernment.org.uk alongside others have argued fiscal devolution was a missing piece of the puzzle in the government's devolution white paper.

Interesting that in the year of the Mokyr Nobel, the government has gone all in on Bob Allen thought!

I think Rachel Reeves’ Mais lecture today does a good job of setting out the thinking behind the government’s growth strategy. In her telling, it combines planning reform (to get more stuff built) a more active state (to invest in key sectors) and raising labour costs (to get companies to invest)

At a time of rising antisemitism, the Trump administration is trying to make American Jews into wards of the state, whose safety depends on political compliance. It's a bargain we should refuse, as I explain here: forward.com/opinion/8126...

Such a dismal tale about the UK govt: so obsessed w competing with far-right to keep out foreigners that it won’t let in the brightest & best from war-torn countries even when they’re hand-picked by the FCDO, lest they ask to stay. Soft power sacrificed, but how many Reform voters will it convert?

Rabobank on the unfolding worst case scenario:

An economically, politically and morally bankrupt strategy. Bad for individuals, bad for families, bad for businesses, bad for public services, bad for integration and cohesion. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...

before diving into agentic AI coding, learn git. Version control becomes even more critical when you need to undo what the AI did. (And no, letting the AI manage versioning is not the answer.)